ATTICA - North Montgomery’s girls used a different route to a 44-17 win over Attica Friday.
Their leading scorer was on the bench with foul trouble, so they found different scorers.
They had to change up the defense, and that worked too.
The bench brought in solid minutes, and the Chargers picked up the win to even their season at 2-2, while the Red Ramblers fall to 0-2.
Madi Welch was the leader on the floor for North, as the senior posted a season-high 16 points.
The senior guard also dished out three assists and had seven steals, plus blocked a shot.
Welch’s scoring was on the heels of leading scorer Katie Rice picking up an early second foul and spending quality time on the bench.
“It was good to have the other girls step up when Rice got into foul trouble,” North coach Ryan Nuppnau said. “Madi did a great job controlling her body, handling the ball driving and then going 5-of-7 from the line.”
Rice, averaging 20.7 points the first three games, got a single bucket in the first half, but her Chargers were still leading 21-11 at the break, as Welch put 11 of her points up in that time frame, and Piper Ramey game off the bench to go 3-of-3 from the field in the second quarter. The freshman finished with seven points.
“It was good to see the rest of the girls being aggressive on the offensive end,” Nuppnau said. “Even with our leading scorer on the bench, we put the ball in the basket.”
Rice’s time on the pine also changed the Chargers’ defensive strategy.
“We haven’t played much zone at all,” Nuppnau mentioned, “but with Rice out we went to the zone, and the girls did a good job taking away a lot of what Attica was trying to do.”
That defense extended into the second half, as the Chargers pitched a third-quarter shutout on the scoreboard and forced 10 Red Rambler turnovers that became 10 more points.
“The zone defense let us move our bigs down in the paint,” Nuppnau noted. “That gave the guards freedom to be more aggressive.”
That defense forced 22 turnovers and the offense scored 18 off those miscues.
In addition, North held a 39-27 rebound advantage.
Rice was back in the lineup in the second half and scored six of her eight points and grabbed five of her seven rebounds.
Lydia Dugard held the middle ground all game, also getting seven boards and going 4-of-6 from the line and grabbing two steals. The senior finished with six points.
“We got really good minutes off the bench,” Nuppnau said. “(Madison) Banta and (Maely) Gaskin really played hard.”
The two juniors combined for seven rebounds. Banta also had a steal and an assist.
The Chargers were 16-of-42 from the field, 2-of-9 from deep and 10-of-16 from the line. They finished with 17 turnovers, but the Red Ramblers could only muster three points off those TOs.
Attica was 5-of-35 from the field, 1-of-13 from long range and 6-of-10 from the line. Sophomore Adyson Goodwin scored 15 of their 17 points.
The Chargers move from the early rugged start of the season into another rugged week, as they have three games again next week. They open Sagamore Conference action Tuesday against Frankfort, and then play two at the Sugar Creek Classic.
“Coach (Matt)Voorhees gives us a word of the week,” Nuppnau said of his assistant coach, “and this week it was ‘resiliency.’ We have two big weeks, and we didn’t look down, didn’t fold. We brought our game tonight and played our game tonight. We bounced back from a couple tough early opponents and did a good job.”
The Frankfort game is on the road and the Classic games are at Western Boone. The Chargers play the Stars Friday.
